Modem electronic equipment often contains enclosures that must be maintained free from contamination. In the computer industry, adsorbent filters can be used within the enclosures to protect the electronic components from contaminants, such as water vapor, acidic gases, and volatile organic compounds. For example, disk drives often include adsorbent filters within the disk drive and/or are provided over an opening in the disk drive housing to protect the drive components and the disks from contaminants, such as water vapor, hydrocarbons, and acidic gas. Without such protection, these contaminants can lead to stiction, corrosion, and, in some instances, drive failure.
The filters used in electronic enclosures generally contain filter media, a housing, and a pressure sensitive adhesive on the housing to secure the filter inside the electronic enclosure. A removable release liner normally covers the pressure sensitive adhesive. The release liner prevents fouling of the adhesive during shipping and storage, while also avoiding unintentional adherence of the filter to shipping media or to other filters. The filters are usually packaged and shipped on trays containing numerous filters, along with the release liner secured to each one of the filters. The tray and filters are also sealed in order to prevent contamination. During installation in an electronic enclosure each filter is lifted from the tray, the release liner is removed, and the filter is placed within an appropriate enclosure. Traditional shipping methods usually require that the release liner be individually removed from each of the filters as they are installed. These shipping methods can be troublesome because they require a labor-intensive step of individually removing each release liner from each filter as they are installed.
Efforts have been made to produce filters that have release liners secured directly to the carrier tray. Unfortunately, such efforts have not been entirely successful, resulting in problems removing the filter from the release liner and carrier tray. Therefore, a need exists for an improved tray for carrying electronic components.